Slackfumasta:You mean that a product with high demand will still make its way to market despite the government's shutdown of local production facilities?

They can't even do that...

The number of U.S. meth labs continues to rise even as federal, state and local laws place heavy restrictions on the purchase of cold and allergy pills containing pseudoephedrine, a major component in the most common meth recipe.

They've just helped us create jobs in the service sector. Locking up junkies is big business. But let's make sure we privatize that so there is a financial incentive to continue to erode our civil rights. We can also mandate expensive psudoscientific treatment and make people pay their probation officers out the nose. More food for the machine...

I'm for the legalization of drugs but I don't know how we can afford it if the government must pay for the upkeep of drug addicts (welfare/food stamps/healthcare/social security). The safety net only works if people are trying to live productive lives.

Vectron:I'm for the legalization of drugs but I don't know how we can afford it if the government must pay for the upkeep of drug addicts (welfare/food stamps/healthcare/social security). The safety net only works if people are trying to live productive lives.

Vectron:I'm for the legalization of drugs but I don't know how we can afford it if the government must pay for the upkeep of drug addicts (welfare/food stamps/healthcare/social security). The safety net only works if people are trying to live productive lives.

Legalization isn't going to make a substantial increase in the number of drug addicts. Also, you can tax it to pay for those services.

meanmutton:Vectron: I'm for the legalization of drugs but I don't know how we can afford it if the government must pay for the upkeep of drug addicts (welfare/food stamps/healthcare/social security). The safety net only works if people are trying to live productive lives.

Legalization isn't going to make a substantial increase in the number of drug addicts. Also, you can tax it to pay for those services.

Vectron:I'm for the legalization of drugs but I don't know how we can afford it if the government must pay for the upkeep of drug addicts (welfare/food stamps/healthcare/social security). The safety net only works if people are trying to live productive lives.

It can't be that much more costly than housing them in jail/prison, not to mention all the time that would be saved in the courts.

meanmutton:Vectron: I'm for the legalization of drugs but I don't know how we can afford it if the government must pay for the upkeep of drug addicts (welfare/food stamps/healthcare/social security). The safety net only works if people are trying to live productive lives.

Legalization isn't going to make a substantial increase in the number of drug addicts. Also, you can tax it to pay for those services.

Further, when their drug of choice isn't quite so ruinously expensive and riddled with contaminants of unknown and often vile nature, some of the addicts turn out to be at least semi-functional. Not much different than my alcoholic uncle, who probably wasn't legal to drive after 10 AM for the last 35 years of his life, yet held down a job for most of that time.

fickenchucker:The legalize people forget marijuana is a far cry from meth and other drugs. Narrow your scope and you might win.

Who draws the line between "good drugs" and "bad drugs"? Is pot a good drug? How about acid? Ecstacy? Coke? Heroin? There's always going to be people who want to nudge the line farther and farther to the "bad" side saying "it's not SOOOO bad".

Meanwhile, back in the US, I have to show my ID, fill out a form, and get a lecture from a pharmacist when I want a 12-pack of Sudafed. And where do meth cooks get theirs? Why on the cheap from black market bulk shipments from China, of course.

Vectron:I'm for the legalization of drugs but I don't know how we can afford it if the government must pay for the upkeep of drug addicts (welfare/food stamps/healthcare/social security). The safety net only works if people are trying to live productive lives.

People in 3rd world countries use meth to help them to work the long hours necessary to make enough to live on.

JackieRabbit:Meanwhile, back in the US, I have to show my ID, fill out a form, and get a lecture from a pharmacist when I want a 12-pack of Sudafed. And where do meth cooks get theirs? Why on the cheap from black market bulk shipments from China, of course.

I think the key here is bulk if you wanted to buy an entire container full of Sudafed I bet you could avoid the lecture, at least. Still need to fil out paperwork.

Vectron'm for the legalization of drugs but I don't know how we can afford it if the government must pay for the upkeep of drug addicts (welfare/food stamps/healthcare/social security). The safety net only works if people are trying to live productive lives.

I'll nibble at that:

Meth? Farking hippies knew the stuff was poison "Speed Kills", Benzedrine/Dexedrine can be misused (if one enjoys being locked in to performing stereotypic behaviors, i.e., chewing one's nails until bloody, cleaning the same spot on the counter endlessly) but doesn't produce the same `high' during the excitant phase. Sell the standard amphetamines OTC. The hourly slaves will be happy and the toothless cohort will shrink.

In 1999 the best estimate of the total number of deaths from all illegal drugs, in U.S., ~11000. Deaths from OTC/prescription NSAID's? ~10,000. Where's the outrage over the Aspirin?

Far cheaper to produce all of these items in the U.S. and sell at just above cost and plow the profits back into treatment for those who think they need it. Those adult citizens who haven't got the gumption to read the `trainwreck' section from the Vaults of Erowid, before scarfing down this, or that? Well, they exercised their constitutionally protected right to do with his/her body what they wanted.

Primary change required would be to impose mandatory minimum sentences on those citizens who sell to minors/interfere with the life/liberty of any fellow citizen while under the influence of a clinically significant dose of any substance (Valium/Booze/etc) - no exceptions.

What are we getting for our tax dollars at present? We are financing a subsidy program for producers/dealers (along with all the `ancillary services'). Drug suppression never seems to do more than harvest the inefficient/unlucky/stupid ~10% of the traffic (same as in `72 when war was declared). Cops/DEA are just price support subsidy tools - `gee, they busted my source, I can still get it, but it's going to cost you...'

/some will require treatment/some will die by their own hand/most everyone else will get to quit `paying' as much and, more importantly, not having to worry about taking a stray bullet or be no-knocked owing to the County Assessor's GIS version of the Platte book entering wrong info (right address/wrong name - `oops, sorry we shot, and killed as you were protecting your home from what you thought was a home invasion by meth heads, we were here to bust a meth lab - our bad...'

Vectron:I'm for the legalization of drugs but I don't know how we can afford it if the government must pay for the upkeep of drug addicts (welfare/food stamps/healthcare/social security). The safety net only works if people are trying to live productive lives.

The goal would be to get them to hurry up and die. Preferably before they breed. Seriously.